The Thruster is a great total-body movement. It works on strength and power within the upper and lower extremities. It’s a good way to work both the arms and legs in one movement. And because it’s an intense exercise, it really gets the heart racing. I enjoy this exercise so much (and believe in its usefulness) that I frequently incorporate it within my group ex. classes and personal training sessions.
So here’s how you do it:
Grab a barbell and load it up with an appropriate amount of weight for your skill level. Then hold it up slightly above shoulder-level. Spread your legs so that they are shoulder-width apart and tighten up your midsection. Next you want to squat down. Remember to maintain your center of gravity over your heels and to keep your shoulders back.
You then want to push hard through the heels and stand up. Once your body is fully erected, push the barbell straight up like you would in a normal shoulder press. Lower the bar and repeat.
I like to keep this exercise intense when I do it with my clients, so I instruct them to make the push up an explosive movement. That way they train their bodies to generate more power. This is a great exercise for anyone looking to develop greater total body strength and/or improve their vertical jump.
Plyometrics are a great way to improve your power and speed. It’s also a great way to burn fat. That’s why for this week I have chosen to include a Plyometric move. I call it “power move” and its a combination of two upper and lowerbody movements, box jumps and pushups. Make sure that you are well rested before doing this exercise, because it will wear you out. So this is what you do:
First thing first, you want to set up a box in front of you. Choose an appropriate height for your skill level. Next, you want to stand a couple of feet away from the box and squat down. Keep your weight over your heels and tighten up your mid-section.
Now you want to jump as fast as possible onto the top of the box. Remember to push off from the heels. Land softly and stand up straight.
From there jump forward onto the ground and position yourself on all fours.
Proceed to do a quick pushup. Make sure to go all the way down.
Once you complete the maneuver, turn around and do it again. You want to do between 8-12 repetitions of it. Try it out and see how it feels. And don’t forget to bring a towel.
As I have mentioned in previous segments of Exercise of the Week, the squat is a great exercise for developing the legs. This week I have chosen a variation of the squat, that being the single leg squat. This exercise is great for building strength and stability in the legs and the core. If you have bad balance and/or hand eye coordination, this is the exercise for you. So this is what you do:
First thing first, stand nice and tall. Tighten up your midsection and raise one leg off the ground.
Then you want to squat down nice and slow, while maintaining good posture, and move your arm accross your body to touch the ground. If you are squating on your left leg use your left arm to touch the ground in front of the right leg. Mirror that for the other leg. So if you are squatting on your right leg, then use your right arm to touch the ground in front of your left leg.
Here is another view of the exercise. Make sure that you are not simply bending over, but actually squatting down for the movement. And remember, keep your core tight for the entire duration of the exercise.
Go give it a try and watch as your balance and hand-eye coordination significantly improves!
Training the mid-section is not that hard-you just have to be smart about it. What most people do wrong is that they focus on the same exercises and then wonder why the results are not showing. When training your stomach muscles, there are two main concepts that you have to keep in mind:
1) work them out intensly; high reps few breaks
2) use different movements to target all of the muscles in the region: the transversus abdominis, rectus abdominis, and obliques.
I think that the best ab exercises are those which combine all three movements into one, which forces the three muscles to work together. This leads to a better workout and better results. A great exercise which does this is the V-Sit Up. Here’s what you do:
Start out lying down on the ground with your legs straight out and hold them about 1 inch off the ground. Tighten up your stomach.
In one motion sit up while bringing your knees up to your chest. As you do this, make sure you are keeping your stomach tight and are initiating the movement from the midsection and not the upperbody (you are trying to isolate your abs, you don’t want to cheat by using your upperbody for help).
Once you get the movement down, you want to do it at an angle so as to incorporate the obliques. Same thing as before, except that before you start the movement you want to be slightly angled to one side.
Doing 12-15 repetitions will target your abdominals in such a way that traditional crunches won’t. Try it out and feel the effect that it has on your abs!
As I mentioned in a previous post, the core muscles are very important when it comes to movement. They are responsible for proper posture and movement. The more effecient the core becomes, the better the entire body performs. Hence, core training is a very important aspect of every workout regimen. Though the core is activated in a lot of key movements such as pushups and squats, it’s also good to isolate it with certain exercises. One of these exercises is the following, and it’s a lot of fun!
First thing you are going to do is put your knees on the ball. Use your arms to balance yourself as you are positioning your knees.
Tigthen up your stomach and then push your body forward a little bit. At the same time, take your arms off of the ball and sit up straight. Hold this position and try to keep the ball still. See how long you can last!
At first this is a difficult exercise, but a lot of fun once you get the hang of it. Once staying still becomes easy, you can add upper body movement (such as rotating from side to side) to make it more challenging.
This exercise is great for strengthening the core. Doing this will make other exercise easier and will make you stronger. For instance, it’s a great way to increase the amount of weight that you can do on the bench press. Give it a try, stick with it, and notice the results that you get from it!
The Ab Wheel is one of the cheapest, yet most effective pieces of equipment that you can get for your own personal use. It’s a great exercise that works the core and the upper body. The burn that you get from it is one of a kind and it’s something that I regularly throw into my workouts. Here’s what you do:
First you take the wheel by its handles and you get on all fours. Start out by having the wheel close to your legs. Then, tighten up your core by drawing in your bellybutton.
Slowly roll the wheel forward while maintaining a tight midsection. Come out as far as you can. Hold at the end for a brief moment and then slowly come back to the starting position.
If you want to get the obliques involved (to target those love handles), then as you are coming out from your starting position start turning towards the left or the right. Again, come out as far as you can, hold, and return.
Three sets of this exercise is a great way to target your core. It definitely beats the traditional exercises because it’s a lot of fun and it makes your body work in a totally different way.
As I mentioned in last week’s exercise of the week, the Squat is a great exercise for the legs. This week I have decided to talk about a varation of the squat, and that being the split squat. It is a mix of a squat and a lunge, so it’s pretty effective.
Now I have chosen to demonstrate teh split squat on a stability ball, but if you are trying out the exercise for the first time I recommend that you do it on a bench first, before progressing to the stability ball (which is more challenging).
So here’s how it goes:
Place your back foot on the stability ball and bring out your front leg in front of you. Keep in mind that when you are coming down you will want to have the knee come over your foot, so that should serve as an indicator of how far out you want to bring your foot. As with every stability exercise, engage your abdominals before beginning the movement.
Put your weight over your lead leg and lower your body as low as you can. With the back leg keep the ball from moving around too much. Hold at the bottom and stand up by pushing through the heel.
If you want to make the exercise more challenging you can hold a barbell over your shoulders or dumbbells by your side.
At first this exercise will prove challenging, but with some practice you will get the hang of it. It’s a great way to target your core and your legs. In my opinion it is tougher than squats and lunges because of the stability ball element. Give it a try and feel your legs getting stronger!
I love the BoSU ball, so this week I decided to add another exercise on it. This time I have picked another great exercise, the squat. Basically, the squat is the equivalent of the pushup but for the lower body. It incorporates the entire lowerbody as well as the core. There are a million different variations of the squat, but what’s great about doing it on the BoSU ball is that it makes the body do two things at once: work on strength as well as balance/stability. That means more calories are being burned and the body trains to become more effecient.
So here’s what you do:
First you are going to stand on the flat side of the ball with your feet spaced shoulder-width apart. Straigthen your posture so that your ears line up with your shoulders, and hips. Bend your knees a bit so that you stabili Also, engage your core by tightening up your abs and keeping your belly-button against your spine.
Then you are going to lower your body until your thighs are parallel with the ball/they make a right angle with your calves. Maintain a good posture throughout the movement.
Stay at the bottom for a couple of moments and then stand back up by pushing through your heels. As you do this try to limit the movement of the ball.
If you are feeling adventerous, try doing the exercise with one leg.
There you go. Try out the exercise and notice the difference that the boSU ball makes when you add it to your regular squats.
For this week’s exercise of the week (EoW) I have chosen BOSU Ball Pushups.
I think that the pushup is the greatest exercise ever created. Why? Well besides that fact that you can do pushups anywhere and at any time, it is the most effecient exercise in the world: its like hitting a pack of birds with one stone. A proper pushup targets the chest, back, arms, and core. Basically its an all-in-one kinda deal.
Unfortunately, too many of the average gym-goers neglect this wonderful exercise. Little do they know about the power that it beholds. For instance, two years ago I was trying to increase my one rep maximum bench press. I incorporated pushups to all of my workouts. I noticed that after a period of time my max kept increasing and increasing. Six months after following my intense regimen of pushups I was able to reach my personal best (285 lbs for those that are curious). Since then I have lost a lot of muscle mass, but through my continuing utilization of pushups, I can still bench press 225 lbs. So there you have it.
I believe in pushups so much that they are a regular part of my clients’ workouts. This week’s exercise of the week is a variation of the pushup that I have my more advanced clients do. It is done on a BOSU Ball which you should find at your local gyms. BOSU stands for BOth Sides Utilized and its simply a stability ball that has been cut in half. By placing your hands on the flat part of the ball, your muscles are forced to work as stabilizers (to prevent the ball from moving) in addition to providing the force that allows you to push up and down. This makes the pushup more effective, because it forces your muscles to do two things at once. Not only is that conducive to more results than regular pushups, but it also burns more calories.
So here’s how it goes:
First you want to grab onto the edges of the ball and fully extend your legs. Try and make a straight line with your body. Engage the abdominals by bringing your tightening up your belly button towards your spine.
Next you want to lower yourself until your triceps/upper arms are parallel with the ground. Keep your abs, back, and chest tight as you do this. The trick is to keep the BOSU ball from shaking, try to make it as stable as possible as you push up and down on it.
If you are feeling adventurous, rotate the ball to one side, do a pushup, and then rotate to the other side and do a pushup. This will make your shoulders work a little harder.
So there you go. Try it out and let me know what you think!
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